


Melting Summer Mists

by Sapphirine



Series: Burning Gold [2]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alcohol, MSBY Black Jackals - Freeform, Mysophobia, Post-Time Skip, i guess this counts as a character study
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-12
Updated: 2020-12-12
Packaged: 2021-03-11 00:35:03
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,232
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28026363
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sapphirine/pseuds/Sapphirine
Summary: Kiyoomi watches the wine shimmer like rubies under the lights, the glass glints like mother-of-pearl in his curled fingers.“So, what’s up?” Atsumu sounds puzzled, worried. Worried, thinks Kiyoomi, and then thinks about the two jars of umeboshi....“I’m on my fifth glass of wine,” he tells him, and then, “I want to kiss you.”
Relationships: Miya Atsumu/Sakusa Kiyoomi
Series: Burning Gold [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1916920
Comments: 10
Kudos: 255





	Melting Summer Mists

**Author's Note:**

> so my semester finals are 3 days away and here I am :)   
> online college sucks ass.   
> Calculus is shitty.   
> SakuAtsu is not.

Kiyoomi wakes up underwater on a quiet Sunday morning and knows the world will be fractured as pinpricks of ache make their way towards his chest, his shoulders, his wrists, his head. 

**___**

It’s 8.36 a.m. on the said quiet Sunday morning when he opens his door to be greeted by Suna Rintarou’s extremely bored visage. He stares at Suna, Suna stares back.

(There’s a bead of sweat rolling down Suna’s temple— a result of the sweltering heat of an Osaka summer and because he probably climbed up five flights of stairs. Kiyoomi tries not to stare at it too much— tries to fight the urge to take a step back.)

Suna’s gaze lingers over his MSBY sweatshirt and his narrow eyes narrow further. Kiyoomi knows better than worrying about the onslaught of  _ why the hell are you wearing that in 35 degree Celsius weather  _ because from what he’s known from their brief acquaintance, Suna could not give less of a fuck.

“Miya’s apartment is that one,” he points to the door in front of him, “But—”

“Yeah, I know he’s in Hyogo,” Suna’s face never changes from its usual indifference. Kiyoomi’s focus narrows down on the familiar stain on the passage wall. It seems bigger than it was yesterday— browner and uglier too. His head pulses, his ears ring.

Suna’s gaze grows sharper, Kiyoomi forces himself to meet his hooded eyes. 

“Then why are you here?” He doesn’t seem to mind his curt demeanour. “Here,” he lifts a bag Kiyoomi had been too preoccupied to notice, “Samu’s in Tokyo and he sent this for Atsumu, but since he isn’t here, he said to keep it with you till he gets back.” 

Kiyoomi’s gloved fingers don’t brush his ungloved ones when he takes the bag from Suna’s hands. For twins who claim to have some sort of twin-telepathy thing going on, they sure seem to have a shitty timing catching each other. That still doesn’t explain why Suna is here in Osaka when his boyfriend is in Tokyo, but Kiyoomi frankly could not be less keen on knowing. He peers inside the bag— there are seven jars: one labelled strawberry jam, another one labelled Beni Shoga, two labelled Fukujinzuke, a Shibazuke and lastly, two jars of umeboshi. 

…

_ Umeboshi _ , he thinks, and then, before he can stop himself, “Has he caught a cold?” 

Suna blinks. “Who? Atsumu?” 

“Yes.” 

There’s a glint of curiosity mixed with something else in his eyes as Suna says, “Not that I know of. Why?” 

“He only eats umeboshi when he’s caught a cold.” 

“Is that so? Never knew.” 

Kiyoomi nods and curls his fingers around the straps of the handbag, feels the softness of the inside of his gloves. Not knowing what to say to that, he stares at the dark grey doormat in front of him. Two more days till its weekly cycle ends— two more days till it is washed. It has been right there on the floor for five days— 120 hours straight, exposed to dirt and mould and bacteria and myriads of other things. He thinks about how Adriah sneezed yesterday in practice— he was 12 feet away from Kiyoomi but. Thinks of the weed growing on a wall in the parking lot. Thinks of Atsumu, who might or might not have a cold. 

He lifts his other hand and moves to close the door. 

A patch of sunlight rests on the back of Suna’s t-shirt which is now turned towards Kiyoomi as he walks towards the stairs, and it looks more olive than black. 

Kiyoomi shuts the door and locks it. 

**___**

In retrospect, falling in love with Atsumu was a lot similar to receiving one of his serves— he had known it was coming. But knowing what was coming didn’t do shit to lessen its impact when it hit, just like Atsumu’s stupid jump floater. The revelation had slammed into him like a full-speed Shinkansen on a mundane Wednesday morning when Atsumu tossed him a pack of Muji’s umeboshi candy on their walk to the gym. 

Kiyoomi thinks of this as he puts another pack of the goddamn candy in his shopping basket in a konbini a handful of blocks away from their building. The packs in the back are slightly dusty. He refuses to acknowledge this fact though, he  _ can’t _ be seen wiping down shelves of some random konbini. 

It’s a startling ability he possesses, Miya Atsumu- how he manages to enter and fill up the tiniest of crevices and spaces, much akin to the dust that seems to creep everywhere in Kiyoomi’s life. Kiyoomi has surrounded himself with a brick wall built meticulously: whole and solid, gaps and cracks filled with concrete. Atsumu never brings a sledgehammer to bring the wall down, nor does he bring a chisel to carve it away. He simply lingers close to it, breathes, laughs, exists and traces of his scent waft up towards Kiyoomi from the never-filling holes of weather-worn bricks. 

And that is the downfall, isn’t it- now it’s Kiyoomi who wrenches away a brick so he can peek at golden hair and amber eyes. It’s Kiyoomi who breaks another brick to make enough space for calloused setter-fingers with perfectly arched nails. And then another brick and then some more. 

Atsumu’s smugness radiates brilliantly, for this is perhaps yet another victory for him— _ how the tables have turned _ , his eyes seem to say, _ what better way to destroy something than to have its creator bring it down himself? _

_ … _

He adds a pack of wipes to his basket and then three more. The store is out of the unscented ones— it’s either roses or orange. Roses are disgusting with their sickly sweet smell. A 3-litre bottle of Savlon CHLORHEXIDINE GLUCONATE & CETRIMIDE solution that is orange in colour but smells nothing like oranges is added to the basket along with the four packs of orange-smelling wipes that are not orange in colour.  _ Ironic _ , he thinks faintly. Someone coughs. Kiyoomi moves away to another aisle. 

When he steps out of the konbini, he’s carrying four strips of Advil and four packs of heat patches along with the CHLORHEXIDINE GLUCONATE & CETRIMIDE solution and orange-smelling wipes. 

Kiyoomi pops a piece of hard umeboshi candy in his mouth as he walks. There’s a small park on the way to his apartment— he sees Sasha the heterochromatic Siberian husky. One of her eyes is frosty blue, bluer than the summer sky; the other one is murky brown, so dark that her pupil gets swallowed up in it sometimes. 

The cicadas are so loud— is that why his head is pulsing? The candy is bland. His lungs are tight, there are ugly brown stains on the footpath and the sharp tang of sweat seems omnipresent. His body isn’t in sync with his body, his body isn’t in sync with his thoughts and he isn’t in sync with his thoughts; he’s just a stain on a wall, a doormat to be changed, a container that has run out of soap, a house that needs to be deep-cleaned. He’s— underwater. 

It’s 6.46 p.m. It’s a quiet Monday evening. Kiyoomi checks his FitBit and observes his own rapid heartbeat and resumes walking home.

**___**

“Are ya havin’ a heart attack? Was there a cockroach and ya blew up the buildin’? Wait, is there a spider-?” Atsumu picks up his phone after the fourth ring. 

“Why the fuck would you think that?” Kiyoomi speaks into the hollowness of his apartment and tries to search for echoes of syllables to block out the lack of sounds.

“Well,” he can  _ see  _ Atsumu cracking his knuckles, a hundred and nine kilometres away, phone held between his ear and a shoulder (usually the right one), sees it because the sight had become familiar some 6 months, 3 weeks and 4 days ago. “Ya don’t call. Like, ever. Not just me, anybody.” 

“I call Motoya.”

“He’s like an exception that proves the rule.” 

“Hmm.” Kiyoomi watches the wine shimmer like rubies under the lights, the glass glints like mother-of-pearl in his curled fingers. 

“So, what’s up?” Atsumu sounds puzzled, worried.  _ Worried _ , thinks Kiyoomi, and then thinks about the two jars of umeboshi. 

_... _

“I’m on my fifth glass of wine,” he tells him, and then, “I want to kiss you.” 

The familiar beep-beep-beep sounds bounce off his skull as Atsumu promptly hangs up. Kiyoomi takes one sip of his wine and counts the seconds. He’s on his one hundred and fifteenth one when his phone rings again. He waits until the fourth ring and then picks up. 

“Ya, ya can’t just say that!” Atsumu’s voice is frantic, Kiyoomi’s fingers shake. 

“I just did.” The alcohol seeps through his entirety like the damp chill of an underwater-day. 

“Yer weirder when yer drunk,” says Atsumu. 

Kiyoomi listens for the echoes of every fragment of Kansai-ben and sinks deeper in silence. 

He doesn’t hang up and the  _ beep-beep-beeps _ don’t resonate for a long time, which means Atsumu doesn’t hang up either. 

**___**

There’s a trail of tiny pieces of jigsaw puzzle that Atsumu has scattered throughout his life— sometimes in gaps between floorboards, sometimes hidden under the pots of Kiyoomi’s plants, sometimes on the court, tucked inside a knee pad, sometimes in the corners of Kiyoomi’s kitchen drawers. People collect coins and wines and stamps and gemstones; they’re all useless— Kiyoomi collects metaphorical jigsaw puzzle pieces about a certain golden haired setter and  _ they’re  _ all useless because they never fit when he tries to piece them together. 

Atsumu does everything in even numbers on the court (four steps for a jump float, six for a spike serve), but everything in odd numbers off the court (five knocks on Kiyoomi’s door every evening, 11 minutes in the shower, files his nails thrice a week). He likes to eat cereals when he wakes up hungry in the middle of the night but only if it’s some time between 2.15 a.m. and 3.30 a.m. His body is a furnace, but his hands are somehow always cold. He constantly tells Kiyoomi how his fashion sense is absolutely terrible for wearing neon coloured “highlighter” clothes and then goes around wearing a leather jacket over fox-printed pajamas at home simply because. Habitually likes breaking his habits every three months or so. 

“Bein’ unpredictable makes ya more… enigmatic, Omi-kun,” he’d argued on a rainy afternoon, “It’s cooler than bein’ tied up in a routine.” Kiyoomi doesn’t remember how he countered that. It seems so long ago, back when he was still too hesitant to try putting the puzzle together. 

Third day of practice without Atsumu’s loud, yelling presence; second day of Kiyoomi being underwater. Their second string setter is certainly skilled— his tosses arch with practised precision. But he can see his setter dump coming from a mile away— there’s no enigma. It’s Kiyoomi who lands the first service ace that day but no one whines about having to do the dishes because they lost a bet. He ignores Bokuto’s sniffle, their captain clearing his throat. Ignores Barnes wiping his sweat— Kiyoomi has seen that same towel three days in a row. Instead, he counts the drops of sweat on the floor; 26, an even number. 

His teammates are judicious enough not to say anything when he sits on the bench halfway through the practice with an ice pack pressed to his wrist. 

_ One _ , he thinks and breathes, his breaths are not damp. 

_ Two _ , it’s better now that he’s wearing a mask. 

_ Three _ , there’s a bead of sweat rolling down his back and another between his pectorals, but that’s  _ alright _ . 

_ Four _ , he can’t stop at four, that’s an even number and he’s off the court. 

_ Five,  _ the neatly printed label on the red coloured lid of the jar:  _ umeboshi. _

Kiyoomi puts the ice pack away and goes back to practice. 

**___**

_ How was practice? _ [20:04 PM] 

_ Blissfully quiet for once _ , Kiyoomi responds. 

_ Don’t get used to it. Samu says he’ll be back in Hyogo in a few days, then he can take over and I can come home.  _ [20:15 PM] 

Aren’t you already home, Kiyoomi considers asking and then thinks back to the last time he thought of Tokyo as  _ his _ home. 

_ Is your father well now? _ is what he ends up typing instead. 

_ Yeah. They’re letting him out of the hospital tomorrow.  _ [20:18 PM] 

_ Good _ , Kiyoomi types,  _ take care then.  _

_ Yessir. _ (☞ﾟ∀ﾟ)☞ [20:22 PM] 

**___**

“Is it difficult?” Atsumu had asked him one day, his chin resting on the cold black railing of Kiyoomi’s balcony, watching him wipe down the metal rods. Kiyoomi remembers folding the wipe neatly, remembers how the plastic bag shone a little in the light when he sealed the dirty wipe inside. “My first therapist,” he’d answered, “My parents took me there when I was eight. On the first day, she told me that she understood how much in pain I was and she was sorry.” 

Atsumu, eyes hooded, mouth twisted in an attentive pout.

“I refused to go back to her.” 

“And yer second one?” He hadn’t pointed out the fact that he didn’t answer his question. 

“She said I wasn’t some kind of wrong answer she was there to correct.” 

Atsumu had hummed at that, barely audible. Kiyoomi remembers staring at him for a few moments, the odd-shaped curve of his body as he bent over the plants to place his hands and head on the railing. “People—” he had begun and then paused.

“It is difficult,” he’d said instead, “but it’s alright.” 

Atsumu had lifted his head and looked down at a plant, the Money Plant, fourth from the left. “Today’s a day, isnnit?” 

His eyes looked murky brown in the strange light, like Sasha the heterochromatic Siberian Husky’s left eye. 

Kiyoomi had nodded. 

**___**

He wakes up to the muffled sound of a slightly off key version of Kana-Boon’s Shiruetto and wonders if he’s dreaming. A few more days, hadn’t he said so? 

Kiyoomi gets up and strips the bed of its covers— puts them in the washing machine. It takes up a lot of space and money but Kiyoomi would donate all his clothes before he washes them in a laundromat. Then he cleans his bathroom until it smells like the Savlon CHLORHEXIDINE GLUCONATE & CETRIMIDE solution that is orange in colour but smells nothing like oranges. He refills the soap container in his kitchen (it’s shaped like an onigiri). He sips his tea and skims through the news. He eats an apple and swallows an Advil. He breathes. 

But when he steps out for his morning run, his mildly rapid heart stutters as a loud yelp comes from the apartment across his own, followed by an equally loud string of curses. Kiyoomi is knocking on the door before he even knows what he’s doing— 5 quick knocks. It’s the longest 20 seconds he’s ever endured and then the door opens. 

Atsumu looks like shit. His hair is everywhere, he has circles under his eyes, he’s wearing nothing except onigiri printed boxers (they must be new since he’s forgotten to cut off the label, it hangs limply from the waistband). He’s also got his thumb in his mouth and is sucking on it angrily. Kiyoomi peeks behind him and sure enough, there’s a knocked down mug on the countertop and coffee is dripping down, sliding across the sleek surfaces of drawers, leaving ugly brown stains. 

“Owmi-kwum,” he says with his thumb still in his mouth and then quickly takes it out. He looks as though he’s about to wipe it on his pants, then he takes one look at Kiyoomi’s face and stops, saliva-covered finger hanging in the space between them. 

“You’re back.” It’s a completely, totally pointless thing to say, stating the obvious— Kiyoomi hates himself for saying it. But Atsumu grins, gleaming eyes; and it’s slightly crooked as always, stretched a little more towards the right than the left- it’s the loveliest thing Kiyoomi has seen all week. 

“Samu came back early. Miss me much?” 

**___**

Kiyoomi cooks dinner for two people. Atsumu sits on the countertop of his kitchen even though he doesn’t fit there and only stops swinging his legs after a tiny crash sounds when his left leg hits a drawer. 

“... and now  _ otosan’s  _ got this scar across his chest ‘cause of the surgery, and Samu and I think it’s kinda badass, but ma almost starts cryin’ everytime she sees it. I don’t think she’s gonna let him work like, ever, now. So Samu’s gotta expand his staff or somethin’, he says he’ll stay to look after the Hyogo branch for at least a year till  _ otosan  _ recovers.” 

“He sent your pickles and jams,” he nudges Atsumu’s knee and Atsumu finally jumps off the too-small counter and makes his way towards the cabinet Kiyoomi points at. There’s some rustling and clinking. “Sunarin brought ‘em, did he?” 

“Yes.” 

Atsumu comes back holding a jar and situates himself on the counter again, despite his withering stare. Kiyoomi stirs the curry and then turns his gaze towards the jar in Atsumu’s hand. His fingers almost cover the label completely, but Kiyoomi can read it still.

“If you haven’t caught a cold, why did you ask for the umeboshi?” 

There’s a silence, not the empty one in which he had drunkenly listened for echoes. He can hear Atsumu’s breaths. 

“I  _ might  _ catch a cold, yanno,” he mutters. 

“It’s July.” 

“I could eat too much ice-cream.” 

Kiyoomi stays silent. Atsumu groans loudly. “Yer such a bastard for makin’ me say it, Omi—”

“I haven’t said anything at all.” 

“Ya- argh!” Atsumu shoves the jar in his hand towards him with a tad bit more force than necessary, it almost gets shoved into Kiyoomi’s rib cage. He grips the jar so that it wouldn’t fall— their fingers brush, ungloved against ungloved. 

“Your hands are cold.” Kiyoomi says. 

Atsumu kisses him. He tastes bittersweet like spearmint mouthwash and his hair smells like apples. Kiyoomi’s knuckles hurt from how tightly he’s clutching the stupid jar of umeboshi and his heart is loud to the point it might shatter. It’s almost as though the weight of Atsumu’s absence is slamming into him now, now, when he’s right here in his arms. 

Atsumu pulls away. “How’re ya?” Their foreheads are still touching. Kiyoomi moves to stand between Atsumu’s legs and rests his head against his neck. 

“It’s been four days,” he tells him. 

Atsumu’s hands tighten around his shoulder, Kiyoomi brushes his nose against Atsumu’s fluttering pulse. 

They settle on the floor with their plates on the coffee table. “Shou-kun said Bok-kun stepped in dog shit again, huh? That’s like, the twenty-fifth time this month-” 

“It’s only the eighth, you over-exaggerating moron.” 

“Shut up, Omi, or I’ll throw that umeboshi in trash.” 

“And get killed by your brother.” 

“He’s too dumb to pull off murder.” 

Kiyoomi’s right ankle aches a little but it’s okay. His head still feels full. The heat is kind of stifling and the sweat doesn’t help. He wants to go outside and try to remove that ugly brown stain in the passage. He wants to buy more orange-smelling wipes, he seems to have taken a strange liking to their smell. Beside him, Atsumu blabbers about the food contest with Osamu that he  _ almost _ won. Kiyoomi’s apartment is full of Kansai-ben. 

**Author's Note:**

> if y'all wanna rant about anime, follow me on Twitter @[XxxAnm](https://mobile.twitter.com/XxxAnm)
> 
> Or my Tumblr @[nonsensicalfrickfrack](https://www.tumblr.com/dashboard)


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